Wolverine killed Beast in Marvel’s X-Men, but there’s a twist

If you know the X-Men’s Beast from 1992’s X-Men Series: The Animated SeriesYou may see him in the X-Men films as a bouncing blue scientist, who employs three-syllable words instead of one. He’s the cheerful brainiac of the classic X-Men lineup.

You’re not wrong; that version of Henry McCoy is very often present in Marvel Comics as well. But in the Krakoan era, the pressure and power of being put in charge of the “CIA” of a mutant nation has pushed Hank McCoy’s pragmatism and intelligence to full-on sociopathic war criminality.

The pages of X-Factor Wolverine — both written by Benjamin Percy since 2020 — he has tortured, framed, and lobotomized in the name of “mutant safety.” He’s created bioweapons, tricked his operatives into killing innocents, and exacerbated a teammate’s addiction so she’d be less likely to pick up on his crimes. Recently, Percy went overboard and was caught. Percy’s twinned X-Men books are racing toward a meaty (as in spilled guts) confrontation between Wolverine and Beast, and it’s going to be delicious when this blue bastard gets what’s coming to him.

Were there other things happening within the pages of comics we love? We’ll tell you. Welcome to Monday Funnies, Polygon’s weekly list of the books that our comics editor enjoyed this past week. It’s part society pages of superhero lives, part reading recommendations, part “look at this cool art.” There may be some spoilers. It may not provide enough context. However, there will be many great comics. You can also read the previous edition if you haven’t seen it yet.

Image: Benjamin Percy, Juan José Ryp/Marvel Comics

As might be expected for a Wolverine comic, this image is gory — but believe me, this guy deserves it.

The understanding of Beast’s potential for villainy dates back to the mid-1990s, when writer Scott Lobdell and artist Roger Cruz introduced an alternate-universe Henry McCoy (eventually known as “Dark Beast”) who’d gone full over the ethical ledge to mad scientist.

Writers like Brian Michael Bendis have expressed this by giving Hank a god complex, where he unilaterally makes decisions like “I should bring the X-Men’s younger selves forward in time to remind the present ones of their ideals and dreams, I’ll definitely be able to keep anything bad from happening as a result of that.”

But it’s one thing to create the time-displaced young X-Men, and another to murder Wolverine, mess with his resurrection so he comes back as a mindless, biddable monster of an assassin, and tell the folks in charge of mutant resurrection that it was all Logan’s idea for a top-secret mission anyway. Logan was able to get his teeth into Hank, although Logan is now able to do more. This will be just the start of the struggle between a nigh-unkillable weapon (and a nigh-unbeatable strategy)

Image: Charles Soule, Ryan Browne/Image Comics

Eight Billion Genies, the story of what happens when every single person in the world is simultaneously given one genie wish — told in chunks of the first eight minutes, the first eight hours, the first eight days, etc. — is winding up its story next month with an oversized issue covering the first eight The centuriesAfter the world turns mad. Watching Charles Soule and Ryan Browne’s bizarre creativity in this series has been an absolutely wild ride, and however they bring it home, I’m going to relish it.

Image: Alyssa Wong, Haining/DC Comics

I find myself really intrigued by DC Comics’ Lazarus Planet anthologies — even though I usually don’t enjoy every story in them. The idea of using at most one chapter of each book as a story to introduce a new hero, and having that character confirmed in the next book’s starring role is a great strategy.

Another thing I enjoy: The character design. Xanthe the new nonbinary hero is at the center of Spirit WorldThe miniseries is a revival of an obscure Jack Kirby story. Alyssa Woong, a winner of the Alyssa Award, joins Haining as an artist for a story about John Constantine and Xanthe saving Batgirl Cassandra Cain’s life from hopping vampirics. Spirit WorldThis month’s honorees, Asian Americans and Pacific Islanders Month will begin in May.